Apple’s MacBook Pro memory problem is worse than ever::Apple still sells expensive “Pro” computers with just 8GB of RAM and charges a fortune for more.
Then stop buying it.
I have the feeling that a big chunk of apple consumers (I know there are many professionals and developers that love apple) don’t even know what RAM is used for and will just buy it because it’s the “cheapest version of the newest thing” without much critical consideration
Wish I could. I hate working on Macs, but it seems like half of my mission-critical programs at work are Mac exclusive for some reason. Apple really pushed the “we’re built for art and artists” thing, so there are a lot of programs in the fine arts world that are Mac exclusive. Digital art, music, live entertainment, etc are all wholly dependent on Macs, purely because the programs needed to make those things are Mac exclusive.
Wait what? I’ve been using windows exclusively for art and music. Not specifically for live music and nothing stops me from that. What are these exclusive Mac apps that can’t be replaced with something else?
They’ve put a lot of work into locking people into an ecosystem. To pick one example, if you’ve got a Logic project you want someone to be able to edit, even if you manage to migrate it with all of the required stuff, they’re still going to need a Mac to open it.
deleted by creator
I will be the devil’s advocate here and say that having the 8 Gb ram config on their cheapest machines (MBA, Mac Mini) is perfectly fine, but having it as the base config on the MBP is borderline false advertising.
This guy has never used Powerpoint on a Mac.
For the price of a Mac Book Air you can literally get a better, more powerful laptop with 16 GB of RAM.
And if you don’t need 16 GB of RAM you can get a significantly cheaper laptop.
Apple isn’t worth its price. You’re literally paying for the name.
My Dad’s wife said she wanted the iPhone. Me and brother tried to tell her it’s not worth it. She said she wanted the new iPhone because it’s trendy and she can show it to all her friends. THAT is why people buy Apple.
The Apple M processors really are game changers. Not only are they fast but generate little heat and sip power. I’m a software developer and use an M1 Pro for work. When I went on the road with it the first time I forgot to get out the charger and plug it in when I setup at a table. Realized it at lunch and shocked I still had plenty of battery left it unplugged. I worked the entire 8 hour day on battery. You won’t find an Intel or AMD processor that’ll do that.
I still have my home-built AMD 5950x PC with Windows that I use for gaming and personal projects. I have Linux Mint on my home server. If I was in the market for a laptop that I was going to be using a lot away from my home desk, I’d get a Mac laptop just for the incredible battery life and performance. Apple takes advantage of people for what they charge for memory and storage but the Apple silicon is quality.
Nothing competes with MacBook performance/battery life. Not even close. The M series chips are ahead of everything intel and AMD offer.
If you compare like for like with apple laptops you can’t get an equivalent for close to the same price. Especially weight, battery life, processing and screen quality.
None of these are as bad as they were before, but Windows OS still sucks. Apple isn’t selling bargain devices of any kind. They are more like decent investments (if you don’t include the butterfly era).
I could buy a different laptop, but then I’d have to use Linux or Windows, which are not great experiences on mobile devices.
I could buy a different laptop and get a quarter of the battery life, because ARM and the M-Series chips are incredibly power efficient.
I could buy a different laptop but then it wouldn’t work with my phone, tablet, TVs, AirPods, etc, again, making it not worth it.
Complain about Apple all you want, but their hardware and overall UX aren’t even close to being matched by other manufacturers.
I have personally never met anyone who would admit to using something just to show off to their friends. I’m a hillbilly though so maybe it’s a bit different here. That type of talk is almost universally despised in hillbilly honor culture.
I use an iPhone because I like it. Plain and simple. They’re easy enough for me to do basic repairs (screen and battery replacement), and I have no interest in tinkering with it or anything like that.
I transitioned from the iPod to the iPod touch and the phone was a no brainer for me. I have photos going back over a decade and everything transfers easily.
Yeah, the anti-Apple crowd on here has this misguided notion that the only reason everyone buys Apple is “social status” - which while not a 0 factor, is definitely not the primary factor. If you’re going to be spending iPhone money you might as well get the best out there, which imo is currently the iPhone, but is an opinion that varies based on what someone uses their devices for
If I’d be buying a practical phone I’d be buying anything but Apple. But sure, continue deluding yourself. Your bought yourself a good and fair product. Absolutely.
I use my phone for web browsing and a barely anything more. An iPhone is practical for my use case, if a little expensive. Personally I really dislike the android interface, and that’s enough for me.
This is peak blind ignorant hate
Blind and ignorant you say? Sounds like I found the apple fan boys.
I’ve used several major Linux distributions, windows, and macOS. I’ve used Android, Windows Mobile, Windows Phone, and iOS. I’ve used watchOS and Wear OS. I do my consumer research and understand why people buy products. I don’t blindly follow any group, I find out what I like and why I like it.
You just spew hate and ignorance with zero justification tied to reality. you come across as a fool, and you should not be happy about that.
I’m positive the minimum went up to 16gb like a generation or two back. It’s sickening that they went back over.
I have a couple of work MacBooks with 8gb for managers and they often complain of them going slow as molasses when having a good few tabs open in chrome. I’m talking less then 10 though, but heavy sites like email and AdWords and other horrible sites.
Yeah I’m a fan boy but I agree with this 100%. In the old days I’d just buy lowest ram config and then replace with after market but obviously we dont have the option anymore. It sucks because I could use at least 64 in my m3 but it was cost prohibitive.
The base model isn’t really the base model. If you are buying a Mac you just have to accept you are spending $2k on it
Yup. The MacBook I would actually want is about $1.9-2.3k, but Windows laptops with similar specs also cost a similar amount, so I guess I’ll stick with my current one.
deleted by creator
Apple has surpassed its peak age. Downfall is coming.
I think what Apple has done with their M series of chips is actually incredible and very interesting. However actually purchasing their hardware is just out of the question when I’m just going to run a Linux distro on whatever I purchase.
If you have a problem with Apple hardware, don’t buy it. Simple as.
They do this because they know people will buy it. If less people bought it, they would stop doing it.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong since their ultra zealous base will continue to buy their complete asinine bullshit products at their shitty premiums and anti consumer practices.
Remember the G4 iBook? I used the crap out of that machine, it was built like a tank. I upgraded the ram, installed a new wifi card, swapped the broken keyboard and bought a new battery, all by myself. The little beast still runs, albeit suffering a lot with new modern, web based tasks.
The Macbook M1 I got from work makes me terrified to even use it, because it feels so fragile in comparison. I don’t carry it around like I used to do with the iBook.
Is it a MBP M1? The ones they’ve been handing out at my office are tanks compared to the pre-2017 (modern) MacBooks.
I think that’s also just part of how laptops are made now. How Thin/Light a laptop is can be a major selling point
11GB idling?? Maybe not as optimized as it seems…
That’s just cached memory. Pretty common practice for any modern OS to retain memory until 60% usage or so. Costs nothing and is snappier performance.
11GB idling is only after having done other things. When you launch it’ll be less than 2 in my experience.
Ohhh right, I totally forgot about that. Remember reading about it somewhere. In that case, I guess it makes more sense.
Yeah you need to be careful what memory numbers you read - I’ve seen some of them hit terabytes on my Mac, and I only have a 256GB SSD so there’s no way that’s physically possible. Just because a memory address is tracked by the kernel doesn’t mean it’s actually being used. You can have a single region of memory counted multiple times (in my case, probably millions of times… I don’t think I was using much swap at all).
Is it not still dead simple to add more RAM yourself?
Nope. Soldered directly onto the motherboard now and no expansion.
…wow. lololol omfg.
They’ll get to that when they add a microSD slot to their phones, that being when hell freezes over.
Honestly 8GiB is not a problem at all on the m1. I personally use mine about as hard as I use my 2018 razer blade advanced with 64 gb of ram. The fast storage in the first Apple silicon laptops allow for swap so fast that it just doesn’t matter. (Swap being kind of like using your storage as ram for folks who don’t know) the only time I found myself wanting is when I was running any servers for hosting local games or for extra gpu capabilites while viewing large intricate sliced files in cura. I can’t speak much for m2 or m3 but m1 it was a solid option to go with the base considering you were getting the best speakers and some of the best build quality out of such a thin and battery efficient device.
Ssd has limited TBW. Swapping kill your ssd faster isn’t it? Dead ssd means dead M1 laptop. Planned obsolescence.
I have the m1, its a good laptop. But i read the the ssd issues killing m1 within 1 year of usage after I purchased it. Now i only used it sparingly
Yeah, that is true. I’m personally not too worried about it. I was just stating my experience. I’ve seen some m1 airs go for around 300 dollars on local marketplaces in working condition. I personally think they are a steal. That being said keeping your important data backed up at all times is a given. A dead ssd is a dead ssd whether it is soldered to the board or not.
Honestly I’m looking forward to the day it shows problems. I would love to pull a main board from a for parts fully loaded or at least close to it air (doubt there are many out there) and do a swap to see if it works.
